CEN12LA189 · Piper PA-28R-200
Dutch Wings Piper PA-28R-200 · Accident: loss of control in flight during landing
From Houston Southwest Airport (KAXH) to Houston Southwest Airport (KAXH)
Event
- NTSB case
- CEN12LA189
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 0 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Piper PA-28R-200
- Aircraft type
- Piper PA-28
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N56273
- Operator
- Dutch Wings
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Houston Southwest Airport (KAXH), Houston, TXTo Houston Southwest Airport (KAXH), Houston, TX
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Landing · flare/touchdown
- Defining eventThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Loss of control in flight
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Substantial
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Action/decision
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The pilot-receiving-instruction was attempting to land the airplane in a right quartering crosswind, which was gusting to 15 knots. The pilot reported that an application of full left rudder along with right aileron input was required to maintain alignment with the runway centerline. During the landing flare, the airplane encountered a wind gust and drifted off the left side of the runway. He stated that his flight instructor assumed control of the airplane and attempted a go-around, but the airplane was unable to climb and subsequently landed in a ditch. The flight instructor reported that he assumed control of the airplane as it drifted off the runway, and the airplane had insufficient airspeed to establish a climb. He further noted that the pilot did not relinquish his left rudder input, and, because of this, in combination with the left-turning tendency experienced at takeoff power, he was unable to reestablish directional control before the airplane impacted a ditch. The flight instructor reported that there were no preimpact mechanical malfunctions or failures that would have precluded normal operation of the airplane.
Probable cause
The pilot did not maintain adequate crosswind correction during the landing flare and the flight instructor's delayed remedial action.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CEN12LA189
- Event ID
- 20120319X84023
- Case number
- CEN12LA189
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: 967a17ab713d7a79921b42490a0ee4d7b91cb0f320c7669815d7d481e0f3a913; retrieved 2026-09-15T17:29:19.899Z.